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'The ASA noted that the phrase ‘Sofa King Low’ used the advertiser’s company name but considered that it could be interpreted as a derivative of the swear word ‘f***’, which consumer research had found to be a word so likely to offend that it should not be used in ads at all, even when it was relevant to the name of a product,' the watchdog said.

The furniture retailer also took out an advert in a local newspaper which caused offence

Cheeky: The Sofa King has used the strapline since it was founded nine years ago

'Because of that, we concluded that the slogan was likely to cause serious or widespread offence.'

The Sofa King, based in Northampton, defended its advert and said it has been using the strapline since it began trading nine years ago.

'They said complaints made to Northamptonshire Police in 2004 were not taken further by the Crown Prosecution Service and that no complaints had been made direct to them,' the watchdog said.

'They said the slogan simply used their company name to refer to pricing and that the words had not been changed or run together or punctuation used in a way that was intended to cause offence.

'They did not believe the slogan caused serious or widespread offence.'

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Sofa King advert banned 8 years after first sparking police complaints